Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 60, No. 372, October 1846

The estimated cost of the railway, as far as Quebec, is three millions sterling – a sum far too large to be raised by private means in the colony. The advantages would be manifold, and a vast impulse would be given to the prosperity of Canada. The Canadians are anxious to see the scheme carried out, but they look to this country for aid. As one means of repaying the expenses of construction, it has been proposed that tracts of land along the line of road should be granted to the company: the railway once completed, these would speedily become of great value. The engineering difficulties are stated to be very slight.

This proposed railway brings us back to Quebec, whence we have been decoyed sooner than we intended, by the discussion of Canada's military defences. We sincerely wish that these may never be needed; that no clouds may again overshadow our relations with the States, and that, should such arise, they may promptly and amicably be dissipated. In disputes and discussions with the great American republic, this country has ever shown itself yielding; far too much so, if such pliancy encourages to further encroachment. But if we are at last met in a good spirit, if our forbearance and facility are read aright, it will be some compensation to Great Britain for having more than once ceded what she might justly have maintained. We shall not at present enter into the subject, or investigate how far certain English governments have been justified in relinquishing to American clamour, and for the sake of peace, tracts of territory which it would have been more dignified to retain, even by the strong hand. Insignificant though these concessions may individually have appeared, their sum is important. Were evidence of that fact wanting, we should find it in the book before us.

"Extensive though may be this splendid province of Canada, it is yet very different indeed from what it originally was. In the fourteenth year of the reign of George the Third, the boundaries of the province of Quebec, as it was then called, were defined by an act of the Imperial Parliament. By that act it included a great extent of what is now New England, and the whole of the country between the state of Pennsylvania, the river Ohio and the Mississipi, north to the Hudson's Bay territory, where now a great portion of the rich and flourishing Western States add their strength to the neighbouring republic. By gradual encroachments on the one hand, and concessions on the other, by the misconstruction of treaties and division of boundaries, have these vast and valuable tracts of country been separated from the British empire."

England has the reputation of holding her own with a firm and tenacious grasp; and by foreign rivals it is imputed to her as a crime that she is greedy and aggressive, more apt to take with both hands, than to give up with either. If such be really the general character of her policy, in North America she has strangely relaxed it. None, it is true, not even our kinsmen beyond the Atlantic, highly as they estimate their own weight and prowess, will suspect this country of giving way from other motives than a wish to remain on amicable terms with a relative and a customer. But such considerations must not be allowed undue influence. It would be unworthy the British character to fly to arms for a pique or a bauble; it would be still more degrading to submit patiently to a systematic series of encroachments. Unquestionably, had France stood towards America in the same position that we do, with respect to Canada, and if America had pursued with France the same course that she has done with us, there would long since have been broken heads between Frenchmen and Yankees; probably at this very moment the tricolor and the stars and stripes would have been buffeting each other by sea and land. We do not set up France as an example to this country in that particular. We are less sensitive than our Gallic neighbours, and do not care to injure or peril substantial interests by excessive punctiliousness. But there is a point at which forbearance must cease. Governments have patched up disputes, and made concessions, through fear of complicating their difficulties, and of incurring blame for plunging the country into a war. The country has looked on, if not approvingly, at least passively; and, the critical moment past, has borne no malice, and let bygones be bygones. But if war became necessary, the people of England would, whilst deploring that necessity, enter upon it cheerfully, and feel confident of its result. There must be no more boundary questions trumped up, no more attempts to chip pieces off our frontier; or, strong as the desire is to keep friends with Brother Jonathan, something serious will ensue. Meanwhile, and in case of accidents, it is proper and prudent to keep our bayonets bright, and to put bolts and bars upon the gates of Canada.

In Quebec, our Hochelagian friend seems greatly to have enjoyed himself. Judging from his account, it must be a pleasant place and eligible residence. Such quadrilling and polkaing, and riding and sleighing – picnics in the summer to the Chaudière falls and other beautiful places, fishing-parties to Lake Beaufort in the fine Canadian autumn, snow-shoing in the winter, fun and merriment at all seasons. In the Terpsichorean divertisements above cited, our author – being, as already observed, obese and elderly – took no share, but looked on good-humouredly, and slily noted the love-passages between the handsome English captains and pretty Canadian girls. The latter are most attractive. Brought out young, and mixing largely in society, they are not very deeply read, but are exceedingly loveable, and possess an indescribable charm of manner. Owing probably to the extremes of heat and cold in Canada, beauty is there less durable than in the mother country. Early matured, it speedily fades. The fair Canadians make good use of the interval, and find it abundantly long to play havoc with the hearts of the other sex. The English officers are particularly susceptible to their fascinations, and many marry in Canada; as do also a large proportion of the English merchants who go over there. The style of dress of these seductive damsels is simple, but tasteful. In winter, of course, they are furred to the eyes, as a protection from the piercing cold, which rivals that of Siberia. Muffed and gauntleted, well packed in bear and buffalo skins, they are driven about in sledges by their male friends, who wear huge fur caps, flapped over the ears, enormous blanket or buffalo coats, jack-boots, moose-skin moccasins, and other contrivances equally inelegant and comfortable. The extreme dryness of the air renders the cold much more endurable than might be supposed. The sun shines brightly, the atmosphere is crisp and exhilarating; there is rarely much wind. Under these circumstances, the thermometer may go down, as it frequently does, to thirty or forty degrees below zero, without any serious inconvenience or suffering being felt. When a gale comes during the cold season, the effect is very different. Our author tells us of a certain Sunday, "when the thermometer was at thirty degrees below zero, and a high wind blew at the same time. The effect, in many respects, was not unlike that of intense heat; the sky was very red about the setting sun, and deep blue elsewhere; the earth and river were covered with a thin haze, and the tin cross and spires, and the new snow, shone with almost unnatural brightness; dogs went mad from the cold and want of water; metal exposed to the air blistered the hand, as if it had come out of a fire; no one went out of doors but from necessity, and those who did, hurried along with their fur-gloved hands over their faces, as if to guard against an atmosphere infected with the plague; for as the icy wind touched the skin, it scorched it like a blaze. But such a day as this occurs only once in many years."

There is tolerable fishing and shooting around Quebec; trout in abundance, salmon within five-and-twenty miles, snipe and woodcock, hare and partridge. Angling, however, is rendered almost as unpleasant an operation for the fisher as for the fish, by the mosquitoes, which abound in the summer months, and are extremely troublesome in country places, though they do not venture into towns. To get good shooting it is necessary to go a considerable distance. But the grand object of the Canadian chase is the enormous moose-deer, which grows to the height of seven feet and upwards, and is sometimes fierce and dangerous. In the month of February, our author and a military friend started on a moose-hunting expedition, which lasted six days, and ended in the slaughter of two fine specimens. They were guided by four Indians, belonging to a remnant of the Huron tribe, settled at the village of Sorette, near Quebec; a degenerate race, mostly with a cross of the French Canadian in their blood, idle, dirty, covetous, and especially drunken. There are other domesticated Indians in Canada who bear a higher character. During the insurrection, a party of rebels having approached the Indian village of Caughrawaga, the warriors of the tribe hastily armed themselves, and sallied forth to attack them. Taken by surprise, the insurgents were made prisoners, bound with their own sashes, and conveyed to Montreal jail. The victors were of the once powerful and ferocious tribe of the Six Nations. Their chief told the English general commanding, that, if necessary, he would bring him, within four-and-twenty hours, the scalps of every inhabitant of the neighbourhood. None of the Red men's prisoners had been injured.

The moose-hunting guides were of a very different stamp to the brave, loyal, and humane Indians of Caughrawaga. They were most disgusting and sensual ruffians, eating themselves torpid, and constantly manœuvring to get at the brandy bottle. As guides, they proved tolerably efficient. The account of the snow houses they constructed for the night, and of their proceedings in the "bush," is highly interesting. Large fires were lighted in the sleeping cabins, but they neither melted the snow nor kept out the intense cold. "About midnight I awoke, fancying that some strong hand was grasping my shoulders: it was the cold. The fire blazed away brightly, so close to our feet that it singed our robes and blankets; but at our heads diluted spirits froze into a solid mass." Another curious example is given of the violence of Canadian cold. A couple of houses were burned, and "the flames raged with fury in the still air, but did not melt the hard thick snow on the roof till it fell into the burning ruins. The water froze in the engines; hot water was then obtained, and as the stream hissed off the fiery rafters, the particles fell frozen into the flames below." A sharp climate this! but in spite of it and of various inconveniences and hardships, the hunters reached the ravagé or moose-yard, bagged their brace of deer, and returned to Quebec, satisfied with their expedition, still better pleased at having it over, and fully convinced that once of that sort of thing is enough for a lifetime.

From Quebec to Montreal, up the St Lawrence, in glorious midsummer weather, our traveller takes us, in a great American river-steamer, like a house upon the water, with a sort of upper story built upon deck, and a promenade upon its roof, gliding past green slopes and smiling woodlands, neat country-houses and white cottages, and fertile fields, in which the habitans, as the French Canadian peasants are called, are seen at work, enlivening their toil by their national song of La Claire Fontaine, and by other pleasant old ditties, first sung, centuries ago, on the flowery banks of the sunny Loire. Truly there is something delightful and affecting in the simple, harmless, contented life of these French Canadians, in their clinging to old customs – their very costume is that of the first settlers – and to old superstitions, in their unaffected piety and gentle courtesy. They do not "progress," they are not "go-a-head;" of education they have little; they are neither "smart" nor "spry;" but they are virtuous and happy. Knowing nothing of the world beyond La belle Canada, they have no desires beyond a tranquil life of labour in their modest farms and peaceful homesteads.

Montreal is a handsome bustling town, with a prosperous trade and metropolitan aspect, and combines the energy and enterprise of an American city with the solidity of an English one. In size, beauty, and population, it has made astonishing strides within the last few years. It owes much to the removal thither of the seat of government, more still to a first-rate commercial position and to the energy of its inhabitants. Its broad and convenient stone wharf is nearly a mile in length; its public buildings are large and numerous, more so than is necessary for its present population of fifty thousand persons, and evidently built in anticipation of a great and speedy increase. The most important in size, and the largest in the New World, is the French cathedral, within which, we are told, ten thousand persons can at one time kneel. The people of Montreal are less sociable than those of Quebec; the entertainments are more showy but less agreeable. Party feeling runs high; the elections are frequently attended with much excitement and bitterness; occasional collisions take place between the English, Irish, and French races. Employment is abundant, luxury considerable, plenty every where.

It was during his journey from Montreal to Kingston, performed principally in steam-boats, that the author of Hochelaga first had the felicity of setting foot on the soil of the States. Happening to mention that he had never before enjoyed that honour, a taciturn, sallow-looking gentleman on board the steamer, who wore a broad-brimmed white hat, smoked perpetually, but never spoke, waited till he saw him fairly on shore, and then removed the cigar from his mouth and broke silence. "'I reckon, stranger,' was his observation, 'you have it to say now that you have been in a free country.' It was afterwards discovered that this enthusiast for 'free' countries was a planter from Alabama, and that, to the pleasures of his tour, he united the business of inquiring for runaway slaves." On this occasion, however, the singular advantage of treading republican ground was luxuriated in by our traveller but for a very brief time. He had disembarked only to stretch his legs, and returning on board, proceeded to Lake Ontario and to Kingston – an uncomfortable-looking place, with wide dreary streets, at the sides of which the grass grows. Nevertheless, it has some trade and an increasing population – the latter rather Yankeefied, from the proximity to, and constant intercourse with, the States. They "guess" a few, and occasionally speak through the nose more than is altogether becoming in British subjects and loyal Canadians, both of which, however, they unquestionably are. Kingston is a favourite residence with retired officers of the English army and navy. The necessaries of life are very cheap; shooting and fishing good; and for those who love boating, the inland ocean of Ontario spreads its broad blue waters, enlivened by a host of steam and sailing vessels, fed by numerous streams, and supplying the dwellers on its banks with fish of varied species and peculiar excellence. The majority of emigrants from the mother country settle in the lake districts, where labour is well remunerated and farmers' profits are good. But the five-and-twenty thousand who annually arrive, are as a drop of water in the ocean; they are imperceptible in that vast extent of country. Here and there, it is true, one finds a tolerably well-peopled district. This is the case in the vicinity of the Bay of Quinté, a narrow arm of Lake Ontario, eighty miles in length, and in many places not more than one broad. "On its shores the forests are rapidly giving way to thriving settlements, some of them in situations of very great beauty."

To be in Canada without visiting Niagara, would be equivalent to going to Rome without entering St Peter's. As in duty bound, our traveller betook himself to the Falls; and he distinguishes himself from many of those who have preceded him thither by describing naturally and unaffectedly their aspect, and the impression they made upon him. The "everlasting fine water privilege," as the Americans call this prodigious cataract, did not at first strike him with awe; but the longer he gazed and listened, the greater did his admiration and astonishment become. Seated upon the turf, near Table Rock, whence the best view is obtained, he stared long and eagerly at the great wonder, until he was dragged away to inspect the various accessories and smaller marvels which hungry cicerrones insist upon showing, and confiding tourists think it incumbent upon them to visit. Cockneyism and bad taste have found their way even to Niagara. On both the English and the American side, museum and camera-obscura, garden, wooden monument, and watch-tower abound; and boys wander about, distributing Mosaic puffs of pagodas and belvideres, whence the finest possible views are to be obtained. Niagara, according to these disinterested gentry and their poetical announcements, must be seen from all sides; from above and from below, sideways and even from behind. The traveller is rowed to the foot of the Falls, or as near to it as possible, getting not a little wet in the operation; he is then seduced to the top of the pagoda, twenty-five cents being charged for the accommodation; then hurried off to Iris island, where the Indians, in days long gone by, had their burying-ground; and, finally, having been inducted into an oil-cloth surtout, and a pair of hard, dirty shoes, he is compelled to shuffle along a shingly path cut out of the cliff, within the curve described by the falling water – thus obtaining a posterior view of the cataract. Chilled with cold, soaked and blinded by the spray, deafened with the noise, sliding over numerous eels, which wind themselves, like wreathing snakes, round his ankles and into his shoes, he undergoes this last infliction; and is then let loose to wander where he listeth, free from the monotonous vulgarity of guides and the wearisome babble of visitors, and having acquired the conviction that he might as well have saved himself all this plague and trouble, for that, "as there is but one perfect view for a painting, so there is but one for Niagara. See it from Table Rock: gaze thence upon it for hours, days if you like, and then go home. As for the Rapids, Cave of the Winds, Burning Springs, &c., &c., you might as well enter into an examination of the gilt figures on the picture frame, as waste your time on them."

With the first volume of Hochelaga, the author concludes his Canadian experiences, and rambles into the States – beyond a doubt the most ticklish territory a literary tourist can venture upon. Of the very many books that have been written concerning America, not one did we ever hear of that was fortunate enough to find approval in the eyes of Americans. And we are entirely at a loss to conjecture what sort of notice of them and their country would prove satisfactory to these very difficult gentry. None, we apprehend, that fell short of unqualified praise; none that did not depreciate all other nations to their greater glorification, and set America and her institutions on that pinnacle of perfection which her self-satisfied sons persuade themselves they have attained. To please their pampered palates, praise must be unlimited; no hints of positive deficiency, or even of possible improvement, must chill the glowing eulogium. Censure, even conditional commendation, they cannot stomach. Admit that they are brave and hospitable, energetic and industrious, intelligent and patriotic; it will advance you little in their good graces, unless you also aver that they are neither braggarts nor jealous; that, as a nation, they are honest and honourable; as individuals, models of polished demeanour and gentlemanly urbanity. Nay, when you have done all that, the chances are that some red-hot planter from the southern States calls upon you to drink Success to slavery, and the Abolitionists to the tar-barrel! The author of Hochelaga is aware of this weak point of the American character: he likes the Americans; considers them a wonderful people; praises them more than we ever heard them praised, save by themselves; and yet, because he cannot shut his eyes to their obvious failings, he feels that he is ruined in their good opinion. On his way to Saratoga, he fell in with a Georgian gentleman and lady, pleasant people, who begged him frankly to remark upon any thing in the country and its customs which appeared to him unusual or strange. He did so, and his criticisms were taken in good part till he chanced upon slavery. This was the sore point. Luckily there was a heavy swell upon the lake, and the Georgian became sea-sick, which closed the discussion as it began to get stormy. With other Americans on board the steamer, our traveller sought opportunities of discoursing. He found them courteous and intelligent; with a good deal of superficial information, derived chiefly from newspaper reading; partial to the English, as individuals – but not as a nation; prone to judge of English institutions and manners from isolated and exceptional examples; to reason "on the state of the poor from the Andover workhouse: on the aristocracy, from the late Lord Hertford; on morality, from Dr Lardner." Every where he met with kindness and hospitality; but, on the other hand, he was not unfrequently disgusted by coarseness of manners, and compelled to smile at the utter want of tact which is an American characteristic, and which inherent defect education, travel, good-humour, and kind-heartedness, are insufficient to eradicate or neutralise in the natives of the Union. "A friend, in giving me hints of what was best worth seeing in the Capitol at Washington, said, 'there are some very fine pictures. Oh, I beg pardon; I mean that there is a splendid view from the top of the building.' I knew perfectly well that those paintings, which his good-nature rebuked him for having incautiously mentioned, represented the surrender of Burgoyne, and other similar scenes – in reality about as heart-rending to me as a sketch of the battle of Hexham would be. To this day, I admire my friend's kind intentions more than his tact in carrying them out."

The expectoration, chewing, and other nastinesses indulged in by many classes of Americans, and which have proved such fruitful themes for the facetiousness of book-writers, are very slightly referred to by the author of Hochelaga, who probably thinks that enough has already been said on such sickening subjects. He attributes some of these peculiarities to a sort of general determination to alter and improve on English customs. In driving, the Americans keep the right side of the road instead of the left; in eating, they reverse the uses of the knife and fork; perhaps it is the same spirit of opposition that prompts them to bolt their food dog-fashion and with railroad rapidity, instead of imitating the cleanly decorum with which Englishmen discuss their meals. Talking of knives – in most of the country inns they are broad, round, and blunt at the point, in order that they may be used as spoons, and even thrust half-way down the throats of tobacco-chewing republicans, who do not hesitate to cut the butter, and help themselves to salt, with the same weapon that has just been withdrawn from the innermost recesses of their mouth, almost of their gullet. In America, people seem to be for ever in a hurry; every thing is done "on the rush," and as if it were merely the preliminary to something else much more important, to which it is essential to get as speedily as possible. At Boston our traveller was put into a six-bedded room, the only empty one in the hotel. Three of the beds were engaged by Americans. "I as fortunate to awaken just as the American gentlemen came in; for it gave me an opportunity of seeing a dispatch in going to rest rivalling that in the dinner department. From the time the door opened, there appeared to be nothing but a hop-step-and-jump into bed, and then a snore of the profoundest repose. Early in the morning, when these gentlemen awoke from their balmy slumbers, there was another hop-step-and-jump out of bed, and we saw no more of them." We are happy to learn, however, that a great change has of late years been wrought in the coarser and more offensive points of American manners and habits – chiefly, we are assured, by the satirical works of English writers. Much yet remains to be done, as is admitted in the book before us, where it is certain that as good a case as possible, consistent with truth, has been made out for the Americans. "Even now I defy any one to exaggerate the horrors of chewing, and its odious consequences; the shameless selfishness which seizes on a dish, and appropriates the best part of its contents, if the plate cannot contain the whole; and the sullen silence at meal times." The class to which this passage refers is a very numerous one, and far from the lowest in the country – as regards position and circumstances, that is to say. Its members are met with in every steam-boat and railway carriage, at boarding-houses and public dinner tables. They have dollars in plenty, wear expensive clothes, and live on the fat of the land; but their manners are infinitely worse than those of any class with which a traveller in England can possibly be brought in contact. Most of them, doubtless, have risen from very inferior walks of life. Their circumstances have improved, themselves have remained stationary, chiefly from the want of an established standard of refinement to strain up to. It would be as absurd as illiberal to assert that there are no well-bred, gentlemanly men in the States; but it is quite certain that they are the few, the exceptions, insufficient in number to constitute a class. Elegance and republicanism are sworn foes; the latter condemns what the first depends upon. An aristocracy, an army, an established church, mould, by their influence and example, the manners of the masses. The Americans decline purchasing polish at such a price. The day will come when they shall discover their error, and cease to believe that the rule of the many constitutes the perfection of liberty and happiness. At present, although they eagerly snatch at the few titles current in their country, and generals and honourables are every where in exceeding abundance, the only real eminence amongst them is money. Its eager and unremitting pursuit leaves little time for the cultivation of those tastes which refine and improve both mind and manners. Nevertheless, as above mentioned, there is an improvement in the latter item; and certain gross inelegancies, which passed unnoticed half a score years ago, now draw down public censure upon their perpetrators. "A Trollope! a Trollope!" was the cry upon a certain evening at the Baltimore theatre, when one of the sovereign people fixed his feet upon the rail of the seat before him, and stared at the performance through his upraised legs. However they may sneer at "benighted Britishers," and affect to pity and look down upon their oppressed and unhappy condition, the Americans secretly entertain a mighty deference for this country and the opinion of its people. The English press is looked upon with profound respect; a leading article in the Times is read as an oracle, and carries weight even when it exasperates. And with all his assumed superiority, the American is never displeased, but the contrary, at being mistaken for an Englishman. The stinging missiles fired from this side of the Atlantic at Pennsylvanian repudiators had no small share in bringing about the recent tardy payment of interest. The satire of Sydney Smith spoke more loudly to American ears than did the voices of conscience and common honesty.